Yeats's Poems [continued]</table> <link rel="stylesheet" href="../../../../../../stylesheet/stylesheet.css"> <meta name="DESCRIPTION" content="THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN: 'Give me the world if Thou wilt, but grant me an asylum for my affections.' - Tulka; S. Patrick. You who are bent, and bald, and blind, With a heavy heart and a wandering mind, / ... "> </head> <body margin="5" marginwidth="5" marginheight="5" topmargin="5" bottommargin="0" leftmargin="0" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" onLoad=""> <table class="Normal" width="90%" border="0" cellspacing="2" cellpadding="2" align="center"> <tr valign="top"> <td colspan="3"> <p class="Heading1"><a name="TOContents"></a>Yeats's Poems [continued]</p> <P><span class="Normal"> <span class="Bolditalic">THE WANDERINGS OF OISIN</span><BR> <BR> 'Give me the world if Thou wilt, but grant me an asylum for my affections.' - Tulka<BR> <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. You who are bent, and bald, and blind, <BR> With a heavy heart and a wandering mind, <BR> Have known three centuries, poets sing, <BR> Of dalliance with a demon thing. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. Sad to remember, sick with years, <BR> The swift innumerable spears, <BR> The horsemen with their floating hair,<BR> And bowls of barley, honey, and wine, <BR> Those merry couples dancing in tune, <BR> And the white body that lay by mine; <BR> But the tale, though words be lighter than air. <BR> Must live to be old like the wandering moon. <BR> <BR> Caoilte, and Conan, and Finn were there, <BR> When we followed a deer with our baying hounds. <BR> With Bran, Sceolan, and Lomair, <BR> And passing the Firbolgs' burial-mounds, <BR> Came to the cairn-heaped grassy hill <BR> Where passionate Maeve is stony-still; <BR> And found On the dove-grey edge of the sea<BR> A pearl-pale, high-born lady, who rode <BR> On a horse with bridle of findrinny; <BR> And like a sunset were her lips, <BR> A stormy sunset on doomed ships; <BR> A citron colour gloomed in her hair, <BR> But down to her feet white vesture flowed, <BR> And with the glimmering crimson glowed <BR> Of many a figured embroidery; <BR> And it was bound with a pearl-pale shell <BR> That wavered like the summer streams, <BR> As her soft bosom rose and fell. <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. You are still wrecked among heathen dreams. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. "Why do you wind no horn?" she said <BR> "And every hero droop his head? <BR> The hornless deer is not more sad <BR> That many a peaceful moment had, <BR> More sleek than any granary mouse, <BR> In his own leafy forest house <BR> Among the waving fields of fern: <BR> The hunting of heroes should be glad." <BR> <BR> "O pleasant woman," answered Finn, <BR> "We think on Oscar's pencilled urn, <BR> And on the heroes lying slain <BR> On Gabhra's raven-covered plain; <BR> But where are your noble kith and kin,<BR> And from what country do you ride?" <BR> <BR> "My father and my mother are <BR> Aengus and Edain, my own name <BR> Niamh, and my country far <BR> Beyond the tumbling of this tide." <BR> <BR> "What dream came with you that you came <BR> Through bitter tide on foam-wet feet? <BR> Did your companion wander away <BR> From where the birds of Aengus wing?" <BR> <BR> Thereon did she look haughty and sweet: <BR> "I have not yet, war-weary king, <BR> Been spoken of with any man; <BR> Yet now I choose, for these four feet <BR> Ran through the foam and ran to this <BR> That I might have your son to kiss." <BR> <BR> "Were there no better than my son <BR> That you through all that foam should run?" <BR> <BR> "I loved no man, though kings besought, <BR> Until the Danaan poets brought <BR> Rhyme that rhymed upon Oisin's name, <BR> And now I am dizzy with the thought <BR> Of all that wisdom and the fame <BR> Of battles broken by his hands, <BR> Of stories builded by his words <BR> That are like coloured Asian birds <BR> At evening in their rainless lands." <BR> <BR> O Patrick, by your brazen bell, <BR> There was no limb of mine but fell <BR> Into a desperate gulph of love! <BR> "You only will I wed," I cried, <BR> "And I will make a thousand songs, <BR> And set your name all names above, <BR> And captives bound with leathern thongs <BR> Shall kneel and praise you, one by one, <BR> At evening in my western dun." <BR> <BR> "O Oisin, mount by me and ride <BR> To shores by the wash of the tremulous tide, <BR> Where men have heaped no burial-mounds, <BR> And the days pass by like a wayward tune, <BR> Where broken faith has never been known <BR> And the blushes of first love never have flown; <BR> And there I will give you a hundred hounds; <BR> No mightier creatures bay at the moon; <BR> And a hundred robes of murmuring silk, <BR> And a hundred calves and a hundred sheep <BR> Whose long wool whiter than sea-froth flows, <BR> And a hundred spears and a hundred bows, <BR> And oil and wine and honey and milk,<BR> And always never-anxious sleep; <BR> While a hundred youths, mighty of limb, <BR> But knowing nor tumult nor hate nor strife, <BR> And a hundred ladies, merry as birds, <BR> Who when they dance to a fitful measure <BR> Have a speed like the speed of the salmon herds, <BR> Shall follow your horn and obey your whim, <BR> And you shall know the Danaan leisure; <BR> And Niamh be with you for a wife." <BR> Then she sighed gently, "It grows late. <BR> Music and love and sleep await, <BR> Where I would be when the white moon climbs,<BR> The red sun falls and the world grows dim." <BR> <BR> And then I mounted and she bound me <BR> With her triumphing arms around me, <BR> And whispering to herself enwound me; <BR> He shook himself and neighed three times: <BR> Caoilte, Conan, and Finn came near, <BR> And wept, and raised their lamenting hands, <BR> And bid me stay, with many a tear; <BR> But we rode out from the human lands. <BR> <BR> In what far kingdom do you go, <BR> Ah Fenians, with the shield and bow? <BR> Or are you phantoms white as snow, <BR> Whose lips had life's most prosperous glow? <BR> O you, with whom in sloping valleys, <BR> Or down the dewy forest alleys, <BR> I chased at morn the flying deer, <BR> With whom I hurled the hurrying spear, <BR> And heard the foemen's bucklers rattle, <BR> And broke the heaving ranks of battle! <BR> And Bran, Sceolan, and Lomair, <BR> Where are you with your long rough hair? <BR> You go not where the red deer feeds, <BR> Nor tear the foemen from their steeds. <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. Boast not, nor mourn with drooping head <BR> Companions long accurst and dead, <BR> And hounds for centuries dust and air. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. We galloped over the glossy sea: <BR> I know not if days passed or hours, <BR> And Niamh sang continually <BR> Danaan songs, and their dewy showers <BR> Of pensive laughter, unhuman sound, <BR> Lulled weariness, and softly round <BR> My human sorrow her white arms wound. <BR> We galloped; now a hornless deer <BR> Passed by us, chased by a phantom hound <BR> All pearly white, save one red ear; <BR> And now a lady rode like the wind <BR> With an apple of gold in her tossing hand; <BR> And a beautiful young man followed behind <BR> With quenchless gaze and fluttering hair. <BR> <BR> "Were these two born in the Danaan land, <BR> Or have they breathed the mortal air?" <BR> <BR> "Vex them no longer," Niamh said, <BR> And sighing bowed her gentle head, <BR> And sighing laid the pearly tip <BR> Of one long finger on my lip. <BR> <BR> But now the moon like a white rose shone <BR> In the pale west, and the sun's rim sank, <BR> And clouds arrayed their rank on rank <BR> About his fading crimson ball: <BR> The floor of Almhuin's hosting hall <BR> Was not more level than the sea, <BR> As, full of loving fantasy, <BR> And with low murmurs, we rode on, <BR> Where many a trumpet-twisted shell <BR> That in immortal silence sleeps <BR> Dreaming of her own melting hues, <BR> Her golds, her ambers, and her blues, <BR> Pierced with soft light the shallowing deeps. <BR> But now a wandering land breeze came <BR> And a far sound of feathery quires; <BR> It seemed to blow from the dying flame, <BR> They seemed to sing in the smouldering fires. <BR> The horse towards the music raced, <BR> Neighing along the lifeless waste; <BR> Like sooty fingers, many a tree <BR> Rose ever out of the warm sea; <BR> And they were trembling ceaselessly, <BR> As though they all were beating time, <BR> Upon the centre of the sun, <BR> To that low laughing woodland rhyme. <BR> And, now our wandering hours were done,<BR> We cantered to the shore, and knew <BR> The reason of the trembling trees: <BR> Round every branch the song-birds flew, <BR> Or clung thereon like swarming bees; <BR> While round the shore a million stood <BR> Like drops of frozen rainbow light, <BR> And pondered in a soft vain mood <BR> Upon their shadows in the tide, <BR> And told the purple deeps their pride, <BR> And murmured snatches of delight; <BR> And on the shores were many boats <BR> With bending sterns and bending bows,<BR> And carven figures on their prows <BR> Of bitterns, and fish-eating stoats, <BR> And swans with their exultant throats: <BR> And where the wood and waters meet <BR> We tied the horse in a leafy clump, <BR> And Niamh blew three merry notes <BR> Out of a little silver trump; <BR> And then an answering whispering flew <BR> Over the bare and woody land, <BR> A whisper of impetuous feet, <BR> And ever nearer, nearer grew; <BR> And from the woods rushed out a band <BR> Of men and ladies, hand in hand,<BR> And singing, singing all together; <BR> Their brows were white as fragrant milk, <BR> Their cloaks made out of yellow silk, <BR> And trimmed with many a crimson feather; <BR> And when they saw the cloak I wore <BR> Was dim with mire of a mortal shore, <BR> They fingered it and gazed on me <BR> And laughed like murmurs of the sea; <BR> But Niamh with a swift distress <BR> Bid them away and hold their peace; <BR> And when they heard her voice they ran <BR> And knelt there, every girl and man, <BR> And kissed, as they would never cease, <BR> Her pearl-pale hand and the hem of her dress. <BR> She bade them bring us to the hall <BR> Where Aengus dreams, from sun to sun, <BR> A Druid dream of the end of days <BR> When the stars are to wane and the world be done. <BR> <BR> They led us by long and shadowy ways <BR> Where drops of dew in myriads fall, <BR> And tangled creepers every hour <BR> Blossom in some new crimson flower, <BR> And once a sudden laughter sprang <BR> From all their lips, and once they sang<BR> Together, while the dark woods rang, <BR> And made in all their distant parts, <BR> With boom of bees in honey-marts, <BR> A rumour of delighted hearts. <BR> And once a lady by my side <BR> A sorrow wrapped each merry face, <BR> And, Patrick! by your beard, they wept, <BR> Until one came, a tearful boy;<BR> "A sadder creature never stept <BR> Than this strange human bard," he cried; <BR> And caught the silver harp away, <BR> And, weeping over the white strings, hurled <BR> It down in a leaf-hid, hollow place <BR> That kept dim waters from the sky; <BR> And each one said, with a long, long sigh, <BR> "O saddest harp in all the world, <BR> Sleep there till the moon and the stars die!" <BR> <BR> And now, still sad, we came to where <BR> A beautiful young man dreamed within <BR> A house of wattles, clay, and skin; <BR> One hand upheld his beardless chin, <BR> And one a sceptre flashing out <BR> Wild flames of red and gold and blue, <BR> Like to a merry wandering rout <BR> Of dancers leaping in the air; <BR> And men and ladies knelt them there <BR> And showed their eyes with teardrops dim, <BR> And with low murmurs prayed to him, <BR> And kissed the sceptre with red lips, <BR> And touched it with their finger-tips. <BR> <BR> He held that flashing sceptre up. <BR> "Joy drowns the twilight in the dew,<BR> And fills with stars night's purple cup, <BR> And wakes the sluggard seeds of corn, <BR> And stirs the young kid's budding horn, <BR> And makes the infant ferns unwrap, <BR> And for the peewit paints his cap, <BR> And rolls along the unwieldy sun, <BR> And makes the little planets run: <BR> And if joy were not on the earth, <BR> There were an end of change and birth, <BR> And Earth and Heaven and Hell would die, <BR> And in some gloomy barrow lie <BR> Folded like a frozen fly; <BR> Then mock at Death and Time with glances <BR> And wavering arms and wandering dances. <BR> <BR> "Men's hearts of old were drops of flame <BR> That from the saffron morning came, <BR> Or drops of silver joy that fell <BR> Out of the moon's pale twisted shell; <BR> But now hearts cry that hearts are slaves, <BR> And toss and turn in narrow caves; <BR> But here there is nor law nor rule, <BR> Nor have hands held a weary tool; <BR> And here there is nor Change nor Death, <BR> But only kind and merry breath,<BR> For joy is God and God is joy." <BR> With one long glance for girl and boy <BR> And the pale blossom of the moon, <BR> He fell into a Druid swoon. <BR> And in a wild and sudden dance <BR> We mocked at Time and Fate and Chance <BR> And swept out of the wattled hall <BR> And came to where the dewdrops fall <BR> Among the foamdrops of the sea, <BR> And there we hushed the revelry; <BR> And, gathering on our brows a frown, <BR> Bent all our swaying bodies down, <BR> And to the waves that glimmer by <BR> That sloping green De Danaan sod <BR> Sang, "God is joy and joy is God, <BR> And things that have grown sad are wicked, <BR> And things that fear the dawn of the morrow <BR> Or the grey wandering osprey Sorrow." <BR> We danced to where in the winding thicket <BR> The damask roses, bloom on bloom, <BR> Like crimson meteors hang in the gloom. <BR> And bending over them softly said, <BR> Bending over them in the dance, <BR> With a swift and friendly glance <BR> From dewy eyes: "Upon the dead<BR> all the leaves of other roses, <BR> On the dead dim earth encloses: <BR> But never, never on our graves, <BR> Heaped beside the glimmering waves, <BR> Shall fall the leaves of damask roses. <BR> For neither Death nor Change comes near us, <BR> And all listless hours fear us, <BR> And we fear no dawning morrow, <BR> Nor the grey wandering osprey Sorrow." <BR> <BR> The dance wound through the windless woods; <BR> The ever-summered solitudes; <BR> Until the tossing arms grew still <BR> Upon the woody central hill; <BR> And, gathered in a panting band, <BR> We flung on high each waving hand, <BR> And sang unto the starry broods. <BR> In our raised eyes there flashed a glow <BR> Of milky brightness to and fro <BR> As thus our song arose: "You stars, <BR> Across your wandering ruby cars <BR> Shake the loose reins: you slaves of God. <BR> He rules you with an iron rod, <BR> He holds you with an iron bond, <BR> Each one woven to the other,<BR> Each one woven to his brother <BR> Like bubbles in a frozen pond; <BR> But we in a lonely land abide <BR> Unchainable as the dim tide, <BR> With hearts that know nor law nor rule, <BR> And hands that hold no wearisome tool, <BR> Folded in love that fears no morrow, <BR> Nor the grey wandering osprey Sorrow." <BR> <BR> O Patrick! for a hundred years <BR> I chased upon that woody shore <BR> The deer, the badger, and the boar. <BR> O Patrick! for a hundred years <BR> t evening on the glimmering sands, <BR> Beside the piled-up hunting spears, <BR> These now outworn and withered hands <BR> Wrestled among the island bands. <BR> O Patrick! for a hundred years <BR> We went a-fishing in long boats <BR> With bending sterns and bending bows, <BR> And carven figures on their prows <BR> Of bitterns and fish-eating stoats. <BR> O Patrick! for a hundred years <BR> The gentle Niamh was my wife; <BR> But now two things devour my life;<BR> he things that most of all I hate: <BR> Fasting and prayers. <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. Tell On. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. Yes, yes, <BR> For these were ancient Oisin's fate <BR> Loosed long ago from Heaven's gate, <BR> For his last days to lie in wait. <BR> <BR> When one day by the tide I stood, <BR> I found in that forgetfulness <BR> Of dreamy foam a staff of wood <BR> From some dead warrior's broken lance: <BR> I turned it in my hands; the stains<BR> Of war were on it, and I wept, <BR> Remembering how the Fenians stept <BR> Along the blood-bedabbled plains, <BR> Equal to good or grievous chance: <BR> Thereon young Niamh softly came <BR> And caught my hands, but spake no word <BR> Save only many times my name, <BR> In murmurs, like a frighted bird. <BR> We passed by woods, and lawns of clover, <BR> And found the horse and bridled him, <BR> For we knew well the old was over. <BR> I heard one say, "His eyes grow dim<BR> With all the ancient sorrow of men"; <BR> And wrapped in dreams rode out again <BR> With hoofs of the pale findrinny <BR> Over the glimmering purple sea. <BR> Under the golden evening light, <BR> The Immortals moved among the fountains <BR> By rivers and the woods' old night; <BR> Some danced like shadows on the mountains <BR> Some wandered ever hand in hand; <BR> Or sat in dreams on the pale strand, <BR> Each forehead like an obscure star <BR> Bent down above each hooked knee,<BR> And sang, and with a dreamy gaze <BR> Watched where the sun in a saffron blaze <BR> Was slumbering half in the sea-ways; <BR> And, as they sang, the painted birds <BR> Kept time with their bright wings and feet; <BR> Like drops of honey came their words, <BR> But fainter than a young lamb's bleat. <BR> <BR> "An old man stirs the fire to a blaze, <BR> In the house of a child, of a friend, of a brother. <BR> He has over-lingered his welcome; the days, <BR> Grown desolate, whisper and sigh to each other; <BR> He hears the storm in the chimney above, <BR> And bends to the fire and shakes with the cold, <BR> While his heart still dreams of battle and love, <BR> And the cry of the hounds on the hills of old. <BR> <BR> But we are apart in the grassy places, <BR> Where care cannot trouble the least of our days, <BR> Or the softness of youth be gone from our faces, <BR> Or love's first tenderness die in our gaze. <BR> The hare grows old as she plays in the sun <BR> And gazes around her with eyes of brightness; <BR> Before the swift things that she dreamed of were done <BR> She limps along in an aged whiteness; <BR> A storm of birds in the Asian trees <BR> Like tulips in the air a-winging, <BR> And the gentle waves of the summer seas, <BR> That raise their heads and wander singing, <BR> Must murmur at last, ""Unjust, unjust"; <BR> And ""My speed is a weariness," falters the mouse, <BR> And the kingfisher turns to a ball of dust, <BR> And the roof falls in of his tunnelled house. <BR> But the love-dew dims our eyes till the day <BR> When God shall come from the sea with a sigh <BR> And bid the stars drop down from the sky, <BR> And the moon like a pale rose wither away." <BR> <BR> BOOK II<BR> Now, man of croziers, shadows called our names <BR> And then away, away, like whirling flames; <BR> And now fled by, mist-covered, without sound, <BR> The youth and lady and the deer and hound; <BR> "Gaze no more on the phantoms," Niamh said, <BR> And kissed my eyes, and, swaying her bright head <BR> And her bright body, sang of faery and man <BR> Before God was or my old line began; <BR> Wars shadowy, vast, exultant; faeries of old <BR> Who wedded men with rings of Druid gold; <BR> And how those lovers never turn their eyes <BR> Upon the life that fades and flickers and dies, <BR> Yet love and kiss on dim shores far away <BR> Rolled round with music of the sighing spray: <BR> Yet sang no more as when, like a brown bee <BR> That has drunk full, she crossed the misty sea <BR> With me in her white arms a hundred years <BR> Before this day; for now the fall of tears <BR> Troubled her song. <BR> I do not know if days <BR> Or hours passed by, yet hold the morning rays <BR> Shone many times among the glimmering flowers <BR> Woven into her hair, before dark towers <BR> Rose in the darkness, and the white surf gleamed <BR> About them; and the horse of Faery screamed <BR> And shivered, knowing the Isle of Many Fears, <BR> Nor ceased until white Niamh stroked his ears <BR> And named him by sweet names. <BR> A foaming tide <BR> Whitened afar with surge, fan-formed and wide, <BR> Burst from a great door marred by many a blow <BR> From mace and sword and pole-axe, long ago <BR> When gods and giants warred. We rode between <BR> The seaweed-covered pillars; and the green <BR> And surging phosphorus alone gave light <BR> On our dark pathway, till a countless flight<BR> Of moonlit steps glimmered; and left and right <BR> Dark statues glimmered over the pale tide <BR> Upon dark thrones. Between the lids of one <BR> The imaged meteors had flashed and run <BR> And had disported in the stilly jet, <BR> And the fixed stars had dawned and shone and set, <BR> Since God made Time and Death and Sleep: the other <BR> Stretched his long arm to where, a misty smother, <BR> The stream churned, churned, and churned - his lips apart, <BR> As though he told his never-slumbering heart <BR> Of every foamdrop on its misty way. <BR> Tying the horse to his vast foot that lay <BR> Half in the unvesselled sea, we climbed the stair <BR> And climbed so long, I thought the last steps were <BR> Hung from the morning star; when these mild words <BR> Fanned the delighted air like wings of birds: <BR> "My brothers spring out of their beds at morn, <BR> A-murmur like young partridge: with loud horn <BR> They chase the noontide deer; <BR> And when the dew-drowned stars hang in the air <BR> Look to long fishing-lines, or point and pare <BR> An ashen hunting spear.<BR> O sigh, O fluttering sigh, be kind to me; <BR> Flutter along the froth lips of the sea, <BR> And shores the froth lips wet: <BR> And stay a little while, and bid them weep: <BR> Ah, touch their blue-veined eyelids if they sleep, <BR> And shake their coverlet. <BR> When you have told how I weep endlessly, <BR> Flutter along the froth lips of the sea <BR> And home to me again, <BR> And in the shadow of my hair lie hid, <BR> And tell me that you found a man unbid, <BR> The saddest of all men." <BR> A lady with soft eyes like funeral tapers, <BR> And face that seemed wrought out of moonlit vapours, <BR> And a sad mouth, that fear made tremulous <BR> As any ruddy moth, looked down on us; <BR> And she with a wave-rusted chain was tied <BR> To two old eagles, full of ancient pride, <BR> That with dim eyeballs stood on either side. <BR> Few feathers were on their dishevelled wings, <BR> For their dim minds were with the ancient things. <BR> <BR> "I bring deliverance," pearl-pale Niamh said. <BR> <BR> "Neither the living, nor the unlabouring dead, <BR> Nor the high gods who never lived, may fight <BR> My enemy and hope; demons for fright <BR> Jabber and scream about him in the night; <BR> For he is strong and crafty as the seas <BR> That sprang under the Seven Hazel Trees, <BR> And I must needs endure and hate and weep, <BR> Until the gods and demons drop asleep, <BR> Hearing Aodh touch the mournful strings of gold." <BR> "Is he so dreadful?" <BR> "Be not over-bold, <BR> But fly while still you may." <BR> And thereon I: <BR> "This demon shall be battered till he die,<BR> And his loose bulk be thrown in the loud tide." <BR> "Flee from him," pearl-pale Niamh weeping cried, <BR> "For all men flee the demons"; but moved not <BR> My angry king-remembering soul one jot. <BR> There was no mightier soul of Heber's line; <BR> Now it is old and mouse-like. For a sign <BR> I burst the chain: still earless, nerveless, blind, <BR> Wrapped in the things of the unhuman mind, <BR> In some dim memory or ancient mood, <BR> Still earless, nerveless, blind, the eagles stood. <BR> <BR> And then we climbed the stair to a high door; <BR> A hundred horsemen on the basalt floor <BR> Beneath had paced content: we held our way <BR> And stood within: clothed in a misty ray <BR> I saw a foam-white seagull drift and float <BR> Under the roof, and with a straining throat <BR> Shouted, and hailed him: he hung there a star, <BR> For no man's cry shall ever mount so far; <BR> Not even your God could have thrown down that hall; <BR> Stabling His unloosed lightnings in their stall, <BR> He had sat down and sighed with cumbered heart, <BR> As though His hour were come. <BR> We sought the part <BR> That was most distant from the door; green slime <BR> Made the way slippery, and time on time<BR> Showed prints of sea-born scales. while down through it <BR> The captive's journeys to and fro were writ <BR> Like a small river, and where feet touched came <BR> A momentary gleam of phosphorus flame. <BR> Under the deepest shadows of the hall <BR> That woman found a ring hung on the wall, <BR> And in the ring a torch, and with its flare <BR> Making a world about her in the air, <BR> Passed under the dim doorway, out of sight, <BR> And came again, holding a second light <BR> Burning between her fingers, and in mine <BR> Laid it and sighed: I held a sword whose shin<BR> No centuries could dim, and a word ran <BR> Thereon in Ogham letters, "Manannan"; <BR> That sea-god's name, who in a deep content <BR> Sprang dripping, and, with captive demons sent <BR> Out of the sevenfold seas, built the dark hall <BR> Rooted in foam and clouds, and cried to all <BR> The mightier masters of a mightier race; <BR> And at his cry there came no milk-pale face <BR> Under a crown of thorns and dark with blood, <BR> But only exultant faces. <BR> Niamh stood <BR> With bowed head, trembling when the white blade shone,<BR> But she whose hours of tenderness were gone <BR> Had neither hope nor fear. I bade them hide <BR> Under the shadows till the tumults died <BR> Of the loud-crashing and earth-shaking fight, <BR> Lest they should look upon some dreadful sight; <BR> And thrust the torch between the slimy flags. <BR> A dome made out of endless carven jags, <BR> Where shadowy face flowed into shadowy face, <BR> Looked down on me; and in the self-same place <BR> I waited hour by hour, and the high dome, <BR> Windowless, pillarless, multitudinous home <BR> Of faces, waited; and the leisured gaze <BR> Was loaded with the memory of days<BR> Buried and mighty. When through the great door <BR> The dawn came in, and glimmered on the floor <BR> With a pale light, I journeyed round the hall <BR> And found a door deep sunken in the wall, <BR> The least of doors; beyond on a dim plain <BR> A little runnel made a bubbling strain, <BR> And on the runnel's stony and bare edge <BR> A dusky demon dry as a withered sedge <BR> Swayed, crooning to himself an unknown tongue: <BR> In a sad revelry he sang and swung <BR> Bacchant and mournful, passing to and fro <BR> His hand along the runnel's side, as though <BR> The flowers still grew there: far on the sea's waste <BR> Shaking and waving, vapour vapour chased, <BR> While high frail cloudlets, fed with a green light, <BR> Like drifts of leaves, immovable and bright, <BR> Hung in the passionate dawn. He slowly turned: <BR> A demon's leisure: eyes, first white, now burned <BR> Like wings of kingfishers; and he arose <BR> Barking. We trampled up and down with blows <BR> Of sword and brazen battle-axe, while day <BR> Gave to high noon and noon to night gave way; <BR> And when he knew the sword of Manannan <BR> Amid the shades of night, he changed and ran <BR> Through many shapes; I lunged at the smooth throat <BR> Of a great eel; it changed, and I but smote <BR> A fir-tree roaring in its leafless top; <BR> And thereupon I drew the livid chop <BR> Of a drowned dripping body to my breast; <BR> Horror from horror grew; but when the west <BR> Had surged up in a plumy fire, I drave <BR> Through heart and spine; and cast him in the wave <BR> Lest Niamh shudder. <BR> <BR> Full of hope and dread <BR> Those two came carrying wine and meat and bread, <BR> And healed my wounds with unguents out of flowers <BR> That feed white moths by some De Danaan shrine;<BR> Then in that hall, lit by the dim sea-shine, <BR> We lay on skins of otters, and drank wine, <BR> Brewed by the sea-gods, from huge cups that lay <BR> Upon the lips of sea-gods in their day; <BR> And then on heaped-up skins of otters slept. <BR> And when the sun once more in saffron stept, <BR> Rolling his flagrant wheel out of the deep, <BR> We sang the loves and angers without sleep, <BR> And all the exultant labours of the strong. <BR> But now the lying clerics murder song <BR> With barren words and flatteries of the weak. <BR> In what land do the powerless turn the beak <BR> Of ravening Sorrow, or the hand of Wrath? <BR> For all your croziers, they have left the path <BR> And wander in the storms and clinging snows, <BR> Hopeless for ever: ancient Oisin knows, <BR> For he is weak and poor and blind, and lies <BR> On the anvil of the world. <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. Be still: the skies <BR> Are choked with thunder, lightning, and fierce wind, <BR> For God has heard, and speaks His angry mind; <BR> Go cast your body on the stones and pray, <BR> For He has wrought midnight and dawn and day. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. Saint, do you weep? I hear amid the thunder <BR> The Fenian horses; armour torn asunder; <BR> Laughter and cries. The armies clash and shock, <BR> And now the daylight-darkening ravens flock. <BR> Cease, cease, O mournful, laughing Fenian horn! <BR> We feasted for three days. On the fourth morn <BR> I found, dropping sea-foam on the wide stair, <BR> And hung with slime, and whispering in his hair, <BR> That demon dull and unsubduable; <BR> And once more to a day-long battle fell, <BR> And at the sundown threw him in the surge, <BR> To lie until the fourth morn saw emerge <BR> His new-healed shape; and for a hundred years <BR> So warred, so feasted, with nor dreams nor fears, <BR> Nor languor nor fatigue: an endless feast, <BR> An endless war. <BR> <BR> The hundred years had ceased; <BR> I stood upon the stair: the surges bore <BR> A beech-bough to me, and my heart grew sore, <BR> Remembering how I had stood by white-haired Finn <BR> Under a beech at Almhuin and heard the thin <BR> Outcry of bats. <BR> <BR> And then young Niamh came <BR> Holding that horse, and sadly called my name; <BR> I mounted, and we passed over the lone <BR> And drifting greyness, while this monotone,<BR> Surly and distant, mixed inseparably <BR> Into the clangour of the wind and sea. <BR> "I hear my soul drop down into decay,<BR> And Manannan's dark tower, stone after stone. <BR> Gather sea-slime and fall the seaward way, <BR> And the moon goad the waters night and day, <BR> That all be overthrown. <BR> <BR> "But till the moon has taken all, I wage <BR> War on the mightiest men under the skies, <BR> And they have fallen or fled, age after age. <BR> Light is man's love, and lighter is man's rage; <BR> His purpose drifts and dies."<BR> <BR> And then lost Niamh murmured, "Love, we go <BR> To the Island of Forgetfulness, for lo! <BR> The Islands of Dancing and of Victories <BR> Are empty of all power." <BR> "And which of these <BR> Is the Island of Content?" <BR> "None know," she said; <BR> And on my bosom laid her weeping head.<BR> <BR> BOOK III<BR> Fled foam underneath us, and round us, a wandering and <BR> milky smoke, <BR> High as the Saddle-girth, covering away from our glances <BR> the tide; <BR> And those that fled, and that followed, from the foam-pale <BR> distance broke; <BR> The immortal desire of Immortals we saw in their faces, and <BR> sighed. <BR> <BR> I mused on the chase with the Fenians, and Bran, Sceolan, <BR> Lomair, <BR> And never a song sang Niamh, and over my finger-tips <BR> Came now the sliding of tears and sweeping of mist-cold <BR> hair, <BR> And now the warmth of sighs, and after the quiver of lips. <BR> <BR> Were we days long or hours long in riding, when, rolled in <BR> a grisly peace, <BR> An isle lay level before us, with dripping hazel and oak? <BR> And we stood on a sea's edge we saw not; for whiter than <BR> new-washed fleece <BR> Fled foam underneath us, and round us, a wandering and <BR> milky smoke. <BR> <BR> And we rode on the plains of the sea's edge; the sea's edge <BR> barren and grey, <BR> Grey sand on the green of the grasses and over the dripping <BR> trees, <BR> Dripping and doubling landward, as though they would <BR> hasten away, <BR> Like an army of old men longing for rest from the moan of <BR> the seas. <BR> <BR> But the trees grew taller and closer, immense in their wrinkling <BR> bark; <BR> Dropping; a murmurous dropping; old silence and that one <BR> sound; <BR> For no live creatures lived there, no weasels moved in the <BR> dark: <BR> Long sighs arose in our spirits, beneath us bubbled the ground. <BR> <BR> And the ears of the horse went sinking away in the hollow <BR> night, <BR> For, as drift from a sailor slow drowning the gleams of the <BR> world and the sun, <BR> Ceased on our hands and our faces, on hazel and oak leaf, <BR> the light, <BR> And the stars were blotted above us, and the whole of the <BR> world was one. <BR> <BR> Till the horse gave a whinny; for, cumbrous with stems of <BR> the hazel and oak, <BR> A valley flowed down from his hoofs, and there in the long <BR> grass lay, <BR> Under the starlight and shadow, a monstrous slumbering <BR> folk, <BR> Their naked and gleaming bodies poured out and heaped in <BR> the way. <BR> <BR> And by them were arrow and war-axe, arrow and shield and <BR> blade; <BR> And dew-blanched horns, in whose hollow a child of three <BR> years old <BR> Could sleep on a couch of rushes, and all inwrought and <BR> inlaid, <BR> And more comely than man can make them with bronze and <BR> silver and gold. <BR> <BR> And each of the huge white creatures was huger than <BR> fourscore men; <BR> The tops of their ears were feathered, their hands were the <BR> claws of birds, <BR> And, shaking the plumes of the grasses and the leaves of the <BR> mural glen, <BR> The breathing came from those bodies, long warless, grown <BR> whiter than curds. <BR> <BR> The wood was so spacious above them, that He who has <BR> stars for His flocks <BR> Could fondle the leaves with His fingers, nor go from His <BR> dew-cumbered skies; <BR> So long were they sleeping, the owls had builded their nests <BR> in their locks, <BR> Filling the fibrous dimness with long generations of eyes. <BR> <BR> And over the limbs and the valley the slow owls wandered <BR> and came, <BR> Now in a place of star-fire, and now in a shadow-place wide; <BR> And the chief of the huge white creatures, his knees in the <BR> soft star-flame, <BR> Lay loose in a place of shadow: we drew the reins by his side. <BR> <BR> Golden the nails of his bird-claws, flung loosely along the <BR> dim ground;<BR> In one was a branch soft-shining with bells more many than <BR> sighs <BR> In midst of an old man's bosom; owls ruffling and pacing <BR> around <BR> Sidled their bodies against him, filling the shade with their <BR> eyes. <BR> And my gaze was thronged with the sleepers; no, not since <BR> the world began, <BR> In realms where the handsome were many, nor in glamours <BR> by demons flung, <BR> Have faces alive with such beauty been known to the salt <BR> eye of man,<BR> Yet weary with passions that faded when the sevenfold seas <BR> were young. <BR> <BR> And I gazed on the bell-branch, sleep's forebear, far sung <BR> by the Sennachies. <BR> I saw how those slumberers, grown weary, there camping <BR> in grasses deep, <BR> Of wars with the wide world and pacing the shores of the <BR> wandering seas, <BR> Laid hands on the bell-branch and swayed it, and fed of <BR> unhuman sleep. <BR> <BR> Snatching the horn of Niamh, I blew a long lingering note. <BR> Came sound from those monstrous sleepers, a sound like the <BR> stirring of flies. <BR> He, shaking the fold of his lips, and heaving the pillar of his <BR> throat, <BR> Watched me with mournful wonder out of the wells of his <BR> eyes. <BR> <BR> I cried, "Come out of the shadow, king of the nails of gold! <BR> And tell of your goodly household and the goodly works of <BR> your hands, <BR> That we may muse in the starlight and talk of the battles of <BR> old; <BR> Your questioner, Oisin, is worthy, he comes from the Fenian <BR> lands." <BR> <BR> Half open his eyes were, and held me, dull with the smoke <BR> of their dreams; <BR> His lips moved slowly in answer, no answer out of them <BR> came; <BR> Then he swayed in his fingers the bell-branch, slow dropping <BR> a sound in faint streams <BR> Softer than snow-flakes in April and piercing the marrow <BR> like flame. <BR> <BR> Wrapt in the wave of that music, with weariness more than <BR> of earth, <BR> The moil of my centuries filled me; and gone like a sea-<BR> covered stone <BR> Were the memories of the whole of my sorrow and the <BR> memories of the whole of my mirth, <BR> And a softness came from the starlight and filled me full to <BR> the bone. <BR> <BR> In the roots of the grasses, the sorrels, I laid my body as low; <BR> And the pearl-pale Niamh lay by me, her brow on the midst <BR> of my breast; <BR> And the horse was gone in the distance, and years after years <BR> 'gan flow;<BR> Square leaves of the ivy moved over us, binding us down to <BR> our rest. <BR> <BR> And, man of the many white croziers, a century there I <BR> forgot <BR> How the fetlocks drip blood in the battle, when the fallen <BR> on fallen lie rolled; <BR> How the falconer follows the falcon in the weeds of the <BR> heron's plot, <BR> And the name of the demon whose hammer made <BR> Conchubar's sword-blade of old. <BR> <BR> And, man of the many white croziers, a century there I <BR> forgot <BR> That the spear-shaft is made out of ashwood, the shield out <BR> of osier and hide; <BR> How the hammers spring on the anvil, on the spearhead's <BR> burning spot; <BR> How the slow, blue-eyed oxen of Finn low sadly at evening <BR> tide. <BR> <BR> But in dreams, mild man of the croziers, driving the dust <BR> with their throngs, <BR> Moved round me, of seamen or landsmen, all who are winter <BR> tales; <BR> Came by me the kings of the Red Branch, with roaring of <BR> laughter and songs, <BR> Or moved as they moved once, love-making or piercing the <BR> tempest with sails.<BR> <BR> Came Blanid, Mac Nessa, tall Fergus who feastward of old <BR> time slunk, <BR> Cook Barach, the traitor; and warward, the spittle on his <BR> beard never dry, <BR> Dark Balor, as old as a forest, car-borne, his mighty head <BR> sunk <BR> Helpless, men lifting the lids of his weary and death-making <BR> eye. <BR> <BR> And by me, in soft red raiment, the Fenians moved in loud <BR> streams, <BR> And Grania, walking and smiling, sewed with her needle of <BR> bone. <BR> So lived I and lived not, so wrought I and wrought not, <BR> with creatures of dreams, <BR> In a long iron sleep, as a fish in the water goes dumb as a <BR> stone. <BR> At times our slumber was lightened. When the sun was on <BR> silver or gold; <BR> When brushed with the wings of the owls, in the dimness <BR> they love going by; <BR> When a glow-worm was green on a grass-leaf, lured from <BR> his lair in the mould; <BR> Half wakening, we lifted our eyelids, and gazed on the grass <BR> with a sigh. <BR> <BR> So watched I when, man of the croziers, at the heel of a <BR> century fell, <BR> Weak, in the midst of the meadow, from his miles in the <BR> midst of the air, <BR> A starling like them that forgathered 'neath a moon waking <BR> white as a shell <BR> When the Fenians made foray at morning with Bran, <BR> Sceolan, Lomair. <BR> <BR> I awoke: the strange horse without summons out of the <BR> distance ran, <BR> Thrusting his nose to my shoulder; he knew in his bosom <BR> deep <BR> That once more moved in my bosom the ancient sadness of <BR> man, <BR> And that I would leave the Immortals, their dimness, their <BR> dews dropping sleep. <BR> <BR> O, had you seen beautiful Niamh grow white as the waters <BR> are white, <BR> Lord of the croziers, you even had lifted your hands and wept: <BR> But, the bird in my fingers, I mounted, remembering alone <BR> that delight <BR> Of twilight and slumber were gone, and that hoofs impatiently <BR> stept. <BR> <BR> I died, "O Niamh! O white one! if only a twelve-houred day, <BR> I must gaze on the beard of Finn, and move where the old <BR> men and young <BR> In the Fenians' dwellings of wattle lean on the chess-boards <BR> and play, <BR> Ah, sweet to me now were even bald Conan's slanderous <BR> tongue! <BR> <BR> "Like me were some galley forsaken far off in Meridian isle, <BR> Remembering its long-oared companions, sails turning to <BR> threadbare rags; <BR> No more to crawl on the seas with long oars mile after mile, <BR> But to be amid shooting of flies and flowering of rushes and <BR> flags." <BR> <BR> Their motionless eyeballs of spirits grown mild with mysterious <BR> thought, <BR> Watched her those seamless faces from the valley's glimmering <BR> girth; <BR> As she murmured, "O wandering Oisin, the strength of the <BR> bell-branch is naught, <BR> For there moves alive in your fingers the fluttering sadness <BR> of earth. <BR> <BR> "Then go through the lands in the saddle and see what <BR> the mortals do,<BR> And softly come to your Niamh over the tops of the tide; <BR> But weep for your Niamh, O Oisin, weep; for if only your <BR> shoe <BR> Brush lightly as haymouse earth's pebbles, you will come <BR> no more to my side. <BR> <BR> "O flaming lion of the world, O when will you turn to your <BR> rest?" <BR> I saw from a distant saddle; from the earth she made her <BR> moan: <BR> "I would die like a small withered leaf in the autumn, for <BR> breast unto breast<BR> We shall mingle no more, nor our gazes empty their sweetness <BR> lone. <BR> <BR> "In the isles of the farthest seas where only the spirits come. <BR> Were the winds less soft than the breath of a pigeon who <BR> sleeps on her nest, <BR> Nor lost in the star-fires and odours the sound of the sea's <BR> vague drum? <BR> O flaming lion of the world, O when will you turn to your <BR> rest?" <BR> <BR> The wailing grew distant; I rode by the woods of the wrinkling <BR> bark, <BR> Where ever is murmurous dropping, old silence and that one <BR> sound; <BR> For no live creatures live there, no weasels move in the dark: <BR> In a reverie forgetful of all things, over the bubbling ground. <BR> <BR> And I rode by the plains of the sea's edge, where all is barren <BR> and grey, <BR> Grey sand on the green of the grasses and over the dripping <BR> trees, <BR> Dripping and doubling landward, as though they would <BR> hasten away, <BR> Like an army of old men longing for rest from the moan of <BR> the seas.<BR> <BR> And the winds made the sands on the sea's edge turning and <BR> turning go, <BR> As my mind made the names of the Fenians. Far from the <BR> hazel and oak, <BR> I rode away on the surges, where, high as the saddle-bow, <BR> Fled foam underneath me, and round me, a wandering and <BR> milky smoke. <BR> <BR> Long fled the foam-flakes around me, the winds fled out of <BR> the vast, <BR> Snatching the bird in secret; nor knew I, embosomed apart, <BR> When they froze the cloth on my body like armour riveted <BR> fast, <BR> For Remembrance, lifting her leanness, keened in the gates <BR> of my heart. <BR> <BR> Till, fattening the winds of the morning, an odour of new-<BR> mown hay <BR> Came, and my forehead fell low, and my tears like berries <BR> fell down; <BR> Later a sound came, half lost in the sound of a shore far <BR> away, <BR> From the great grass-barnacle calling, and later the shore-<BR> weeds brown. <BR> <BR> If I were as I once was, the strong hoofs crushing the sand <BR> and the shells, <BR> Coming out of the sea as the dawn comes, a chaunt of love <BR> on my lips, <BR> Not coughing, my head on my knees, and praying, and wroth <BR> with the bells, <BR> I would leave no saint's head on his body from Rachlin to <BR> Bera of ships. <BR> <BR> Making way from the kindling surges, I rode on a bridle-<BR> path <BR> Much wondering to see upon all hands, of wattles and <BR> woodwork made, <BR> Your bell-mounted churches, and guardless the sacred cairn <BR> and the rath, <BR> And a small and a feeble populace stooping with mattock <BR> and spade, <BR> <BR> Or weeding or ploughing with faces a-shining with much-<BR> toil wet; <BR> While in this place and that place, with bodies unglorious,<BR> their chieftains stood, <BR> Awaiting in patience the straw-death, croziered one, caught <BR> in your net: <BR> Went the laughter of scorn from my mouth like the roaring <BR> of wind in a wood. <BR> <BR> And before I went by them so huge and so speedy with <BR> eyes so bright, <BR> Came after the hard gaze of youth, or an old man lifted his <BR> head: <BR> And I rode and I rode, and I cried out, "The Fenians hunt <BR> wolves in the night, <BR> So sleep thee by daytime." A voice cried, "The Fenians a <BR> long time are dead." <BR> <BR> A whitebeard stood hushed on the pathway, the flesh of his <BR> face as dried grass, <BR> And in folds round his eyes and his mouth, he sad as a child <BR> without milk; <BR> And the dreams of the islands were gone, and I knew how <BR> men sorrow and pass,<BR> And their hound, and their horse, and their love, and their <BR> eyes that glimmer like silk.<BR> <BR> And wrapping my face in my hair, I murmured, "In old age <BR> they ceased"; <BR> And my tears were larger than berries, and I murmured, <BR> "Where white clouds lie spread <BR> On Crevroe or broad Knockfefin, with many of old they <BR> feast <BR> On the floors of the gods." He cried, "No, the gods a long <BR> time are dead." <BR> <BR> And lonely and longing for Niamh, I shivered and turned <BR> me about,<BR> The heart in me longing to leap like a grasshopper into her <BR> heart; <BR> I turned and rode to the westward, and followed the sea's <BR> old shout <BR> Till I saw where Maeve lies sleeping till starlight and <BR> midnight part. <BR> <BR> And there at the foot of the mountain, two carried a sack <BR> full of sand, <BR> They bore it with staggering and sweating, but fell with <BR> their burden at length. <BR> Leaning down from the gem-studded saddle, I flung it five <BR> yards with my hand, <BR> With a sob for men waxing so weakly, a sob for the Fenians' <BR> old strength. <BR> <BR> The rest you have heard of, O croziered man; how, when <BR> divided the girth, <BR> I fell on the path, and the horse went away like a summer fly; <BR> And my years three hundred fell on me, and I rose, and walked <BR> on the earth, <BR> A creeping old man, full of sleep, with the spittle on his <BR> beard never dry". <BR> <BR> How the men of the sand-sack showed me a church with its <BR> belfry in air; <BR> Sorry place, where for swing of the war-axe in my dim eyes <BR> the crozier gleams;<BR> What place have Caoilte and Conan, and Bran, Sceolan, <BR> Lomair? <BR> Speak, you too are old with your memories, an old man <BR> surrounded with dreams. <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. Where the flesh of the footsole clingeth on the <BR> burning stones is their place; <BR> Where the demons whip them with wires on the burning <BR> stones of wide Hell, <BR> Watching the blessèd ones move far off, and the smile on <BR> God's face, <BR> Between them a gateway of brass, and the howl of the angels <BR> who fell. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. Put the staff in my hands; for I go to the Fenians, O <BR> cleric, to chaunt <BR> The war-songs that roused them of old; they will rise, <BR> making clouds with their Breath, <BR> Innumerable, singing, exultant; the clay underneath them <BR> shall pant, <BR> And demons be broken in pieces, and trampled beneath <BR> them in death. <BR> <BR> And demons afraid in their darkness; deep horror of eyes <BR> and of wings, <BR> Afraid, their ears on the earth laid, shall listen and rise up <BR> and weep; <BR> Hearing the shaking of shields and the quiver of stretched <BR> bowstrings,<BR> Hearing Hell loud with a murmur, as shouting and mocking <BR> we sweep. <BR> <BR> We will tear out the flaming stones, and batter the gateway <BR> of brass <BR> And enter, and none sayeth "No" when there enters the <BR> strongly armed guest; <BR> Make clean as a broom cleans, and march on as oxen move <BR> over young grass; <BR> Then feast, making converse of wars, and of old wounds, <BR> and turn to our rest. <BR> <BR> <I>S. Patrick</I>. On the flaming stones, without refuge, the limbs <BR> of the Fenians are tost;<BR> None war on the masters of Hell, who could break up the <BR> world in their rage; <BR> But kneel and wear out the flags and pray for your soul that <BR> is lost <BR> Through the demon love of its youth and its godless and <BR> passionate age. <BR> <BR> <I>Oisin</I>. Ah me! to be shaken with coughing and broken with <BR> old age and pain, <BR> Without laughter, a show unto children, alone with remembrance <BR> and fear; <BR> All emptied of purple hours as a beggar's cloak in the rain, <BR> As a hay-cock out on the flood, or a wolf sucked under a <BR> weir. <BR> <BR> It were sad to gaze on the blessed and no man I loved of old <BR> there; <BR> I throw down the chain of small stones! when life in my body <BR> has ceased, <BR> I will go to Caoilte, and Conan, and Bran, Sceolan, Lomair, <BR> And dwell in the house of the Fenians, be they in flames or at <BR> feast. </span> <P> <table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="2" cellpadding="2" align="center"> <tr> <td width="33%"><a href="#TOContents">top</a></td> <td width="33%"> <p align="center"><a href="../index.htm"> </a></div> </td> <td width="33%"> <div align="right"><a href="../index.htm"> index</a></div> </td> </tr> </table> <P ALIGN="right" class="Normal"> </P> <P><BR> <BR> <hr width="90%" align="center" size="1"> </td> </tr> </table> </body> </html>